Manufacturing method of heat flux sensor and heat flow generation device for use in the manufacturing method

A heat flow generation device comprising:

• a heating unit that has a thin heater plate with a heating resistor and a heat radiation measurement plate disposed on a surface of the heater plate opposite to the surface on which the heat flux sensor is disposed to measure heat leakage from the heater plate;
• a cooling unit that is disposed on the opposite side of the heater plate with the heat flux sensor therebetween to cool the heat flux sensor;
• and
• a movement mechanism that moves at least one of the cooling unit and the heating unit;
• wherein the movement mechanism moves at least one of the cooling unit and the heating unit to press the heat flux sensor between the cooling unit and the heating unit.

A manufacturing method of a heat flux sensor comprising:

• a first step of preparing a thin heat flux sensor;
• a second step of preparing a heat flow generation device including
• a heating unit that has a thin heater plate with a heating resistor and a heat radiation measurement plate disposed on a first surface of the heater plate to measure heat leakage from the first surface and
• a cooling unit that is disposed on a second surface of the heater plate;
• and
• a third step of
• sandwiching the heat flux sensor between the heating unit and the cooling unit, heating the heat flux sensor by the heater plate and cooling the heat flux sensor by the cooling unit to generate a heat flow passing through the heat flux sensor,
• measuring an output voltage from the heat flux sensor when the heat radiation measurement plate detects that there is no heat leakage, and
• inspecting characteristics indicating the relationship between the rate of heat flow generated by the heater plate and the output voltage from the heat flux sensor based on the measurement result, wherein
• at the first step, separate thermoelectric elements are included in a plurality of defined areas,
• at the second step, the heat radiation measurement plate measuring heat leakage from each of the areas in the heat flux sensor is prepared, and
• at the third step, the rate of heat flow generated by the heating resistor is measured and the rate of leaked heat flow is measured in each of the areas in the heat flux sensor to inspect the characteristics.